


New Family

by krayana



Category: Eureka
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-23
Updated: 2010-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-13 23:54:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/143069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krayana/pseuds/krayana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The jump to the new timeline has brought a somewhat unexpected change to the Blake family.  Not bad, just...new.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New Family

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladyjax](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyjax/gifts).



> Thanks to Rach, as ever for her beta skillz, all remaining errors are mine. I had fun with the idea, so I hope it translates alright to the story.

The phone beside Jo rang, and without taking her eyes off the screen for more than a moment to register it was Allison calling, she answered.

"Are you watching _Dancing With the Stars_? Nichole has this season locked up," she answered with.

"Jo?" Allison sounded confused.

"I'll take that as a no. You should, she's really very good. And Derek's not bad on the eyes, either."

"Jo, why are you answering Carter's phone?" Allison asked.

Jo looked at the phone in her hand, then down at the phone on the table. She laughed. "I'm sorry Allison. You wanna try this again?" She cleared her throat. "Jack Carter's phone," she said, using the same voice she did down at the office.

Allison chuckled. "Thanks, I got that. I take it he's not around?"

Jo relaxed back into the couch. "Nah, he's in the shower. Anything I can do?" She asked.

Allison sighed. "Kevin's off doing this...experiment that Jack and Henry somehow convinced him would be a good idea--"

"The hoverboards?" Jo asked, rolling her eyes. She knew watching _Back to the Future_ with Kevin and Jack would be a bad idea.

"Yes, the hoverboards. He just called, and they need someone to pick them up because they 'ran out of juice' and it'll be too dark to walk all the way back soon, and--"

"Want me to come watch Jenna?" Jo offered.

Allison smiled. "You'd be my hero, Dep--Jo." She paused. "Sorry," she added in a quiet voice.

"I'm not used to it either," she replied, just as quietly. "I miss my badge." She swallowed thickly. She hadn't said that out loud, to anyone, not even herself, even if it was painfully true. She'd worked so hard for that thing, and in a blink of an eye, it never even existed. She shook her head to clear it. "I'll be over in five, ok?" she tried to sound brighter, but didn't fool either herself of Allison.

Allison smiled at Jo's efforts to bounce back. "I'll see you then. And thank you, Jo." She hung up. She didn't quite know how Jo was making it through all of the upheaval coming back to this time had caused. No fiance, no career she'd worked her life for. Well, Allison reasoned, Jo wasn't actually alone, none of them were, and it never really felt that way.

She was snapped out of her reverie by the sharp knock at her door. It made her smile. Jo might not be a cop any longer, but she still knocked like one, probably always would.

"You're an angel, you know that?" Was the greeting Jo got when the door opened. It was sweet of Allison, because Jo hadn't felt less angelic in a long time. She was, in fact, kind of grouchy. Winter was settling into Eureka, which really meant rain, and despite her previous wardrobe of fantastically weather-appropriate gear, this Jo was something of a nitwit and didn't have anything that actually kept the water from soaking through her clothes. So she was standing on Allison's doorstep, soaked and faced with the task of looking after a tiny person without actual reasoning skills. Although the way Allison kept smiling at her made her feel a little better, pulled at something in her chest and almost made her smile back.

"God, I didn't know it'd started raining, get in here!" Allison insisted. "Jenna's asleep right now, why don't you throw your clothes in the dryer? I'll call when I find Kevin and figure out what's going on. I couldn't tell if they just didn't want to walk back, or if one of his friends got hurt and they couldn't walk back, so I could be a while. Seriously, take off your coat! I can't be worried about you getting hypothermia, too!"

"I'll be fine, Al, go get your idiot genius. Oh, and call Carter on the way? I sort of forgot to leave a note before I left," she smiled in what she hoped was a charming way.

Allison laughed and shoved Jo farther into the house toward the laundry room. "Fine, fine. Take a shower to warm up, too." Then she spun around and left, locking the door behind her.

 

"Carter!" Allison called loudly from outside his front door. Inside on the couch, Carter winced. Yeah, she was pissed.

"Mom," Kevin hissed. "Can't we just leave Jack out of this? Please?"

Allison turned on him. "No. We cannot," she glared at Jack when he swept the door open. "'leave Jack out of this.' It was Jack's idea! So Jack gets to hear it too!"

Mentally, Jack crossed off the idea of offering them something to drink. Then he looked down and saw Kevin's leg. "Kevin! What the heck happened?" When Kevin's face lit up, Jack held up a hand before the kid could get a head of steam going. "And I don't want the science mumbo-jumbo. Save that for your mom. What did you do to your leg?"

Some of Allison's frosty demeanor towards Carter melted at that. She'd gotten herself convinced, for no good reason mind you, that Carter would want to hear all about the hoverboards and encourage Kevin to keep trying. It was hard to remember sometimes, now that Zoe wasn't around all the time, that Carter was a dad before he was anything else.

Kevin hung his head a little and turned red. "I fell from about ten feet in the air, and then the board fell on me. Well, my leg." He shrugged.

Carter's eyes widened. "You actually tried the hover boards? Without Henry?! Didn't he go into a lot of detail about how that was a bad idea? There were a lot of words, and I think a diagram at one point that illustrated a singularity effect if you screwed up one of the equations."

"We tripple checked them!" Kevin protested, wilting under the glares of his mother and Carter.

"A singularity, Kevin?! We should be glad all you need is a few stitches! Really," Allison sighed. She looked over at Jack. "I'm sorry I came here to yell at you. I thought--" she shrugged.

Jack grinned. "Oh, I was all gung-ho until Henry pointed out the reasons he hadn't already made some for the kids around here. Then I told Kevin we should wait until the three of us had some vacation time so we could make it a project and get it right."

Allison smiled. She'd never even asked, and Jack had stepped in without hesitation to keep an extra eye on Kevin. He even seemed to enjoy doing so. Knowing her kids were safe when they weren't with her was a feeling she wouldn't trade for anything. "So you wouldn't mind if we did a little first aid here? I'd just as soon get that leg cleaned up as soon as possible, if it's all right with you," she said.

Jack nodded, and ushered them into the bathroom. Kevin grimaced in anticipation. He grasped for any conversation topic he could think of while his mom set to work.

"Where's Jo?" he asked.

"At home, with Jenna," his mom replied.

Kevin smiled at her. "Yeah? She gonna stay over? Been a while, thought you guys had a fight or something," he said through gritted teeth.

Allison's head shot up, and she may have dabbed a bit to hard with the cotton ball she was holding. Carter's eyebrows were practically at his hairline, but he was the first to recover the power of speech.

"Stay over?" he asked, voice almost at it's normal pitch.

Kevin looked at him like he'd turned purple. "Spend the night. Dude, do we have to talk about this? It's not like we don't stay over here half the time. Or, we did. Did YOU guys have a fight?" He looked between them. "Last couple weeks have been weird with you three. You always said you'd keep me in the loop."

Allison cleared her throat, and blinked up at Carter, who looked shell-shocked. No help from that quarter. And she couldn't very well ask Jo right now. "The last couple of weeks...we've been trying to give each other a little more space, is all. We weren't sure if you were okay bouncing between here and home so much," Allison grabbed on to whatever excuse she could come up with.

"This is home, mom. So's the house. Has been for a while. You guys agreed not to use me as your out, remember?"

Carter finally got his lungs working. "Ookay, Kev, I think that's probably enough talking for tonight. We're just working some things out, logistically. You know Jo just moved in, and we're...adjusting. Thing's'll settle down, you'll see. Nothing to worry about," he babbled.

Allison looked obscenely relieved to have someone else answering the ridiculous questions. "Kev, why don't you got get in the car, I'll say good night to Jack?" Allison suggested.

Kevin smirked, and Allison willed herself not to blush. She turned to Jack. "I just keep reminding myself I'm glad he's talking at all. But--the THREE of us? Where the hell did that come from?!" she was trying to keep her voice down, but this new information was a bit disconcerting.

"I'd say our other selves made some pretty different decisions," Jack replied. He leaned in and kissed her on the forehead. "Listen, go home, take care of Kevin, kiss Jenna goodnight, keep Jo out of the rain and chill Kev out, and we'll do some poking around tomorrow. We'll find out the gossip, see what's been going on and work it out. The three of us can handle it, don't worry," Jack said, letting himself smile a bit. Allison couldn't help but smile back, and nodded.

"Okay, yeah. Goodnight, Carter," she smiled over her shoulder when she reached the door.

 

Kevin when straight to bed when they got home, but Allison caught a smile on his face when he saw Jo stretched out on the couch with Jenna curled up on her chest. Allison couldn't help but smile, too. They both looked so relaxed and sweet, and Aladdin playing quietly in the background only made the scene more adorable to Allison. She reached next to Jo and turned off the TV with the remote.

Jo opened her eyes slowly, registering the fact that Allison was standing over her, she was on a couch, and Jenna was curled up on top of her, in that order. Straight after that, she was acutely aware of the fact that she didn't want to move, she was warm and comfortable and actually relaxed for once. She smiled up at Allison. "Everyone okay, then?" she asked.

Allison smiled faintly and nodded. "Yeah, seems like it. Mostly, anyway. Jenna alright?"

Jo smiled and kissed the top of Jenna's head. "She's a sweetheart. We watched Aladdin when she woke up, but we fell asleep, apparently." She paused. "Al?" She asked, studying Allison's face.

"Yeah?" Allison replied, sensing there was something important coming.

"You know I have clothes at your house? I mean, I showered and changed into my own clothes." She paused. "And so does Jack." She waited for a response, but there wasn't one. "Did you know that?"

Allison was looking confused now. "I thought the clothes were just mine, and, well, Nathan's. I mean, other me and other Nathan. Though Kevin sort of mentioned to Jack and I that the three of us are..." she looked away, not quite sure how to phrase it.

Jo motioned with her hands for more information. "Are...what?"

"Together, apparently," Allison finally said.

Jo looked at her, waiting for some sign that she was joking. She didn't find any. "Huh." Was all she could come up with as a response.

"Yeah," Allison responded. She looked around the room, then stood up. "I'm gonna go put Jenna to bed. You gonna stay here?" Allison was beginning to think she wanted Jo to stay. "Kevin thinks you are, he'd like it." She paused, deciding on what to say. The look on Jo's face decided for her. "I'd like it, too," she added. Jo smiled, and a bit of the sadness that had been creeping in around the edges began to fade.

"Yeah, thanks, Al. That sounds good," she smiled from where she was lying on the couch. "But if you hog the covers, there will be hell to pay," she warned.

Allison laughed and picked up Jenna. "Oh, please. I'm too much of a lady to do such a thing."

Jo's laughter woke up Jenna and made Kevin smile all the way up in his room.


End file.
